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NARRATIVE 



OF THE 



WONDERFUL ESCAPE 



AND 



DREADFUL SUFFERINGS 



F 



Colonel James Paul, 

AFTER THE DEFEAT OF COLONEL CRAWFORD, WHEN THAT 

UNFORTUNATE COMMANDER, AND MANY OF HIS MEN, 

WERE INHUMANLY BURNT AT THE STAKE, 

AND OTHERS WERE SLAUGHTERED BY 

OTHER MODES OF TORTURE, KNOWN 

ONLY TO SAVAGES. 



BY ROBERT H. SHERRARD 






Printed for J. DRAKE. 



CINCINNATI: 

SPILLER & GATES, PRINTERS, 168 VINE STREET. 
1869. 



INTRODUCTI ON. 



The object of the publisher of this narrative is two- 
fold : to preserve from oblivion the deeds of our ances- 
tors, that the rising generation may be instructed and 
improved by their perseverance and triumphs over 
difficulties that surrounded them — and that the future 
historian may be furnished with material with which 
to do ample justice to our past history. The facts 
incidentally stated, that Colonel Paul was the uncle of 
the late Judge Greorge Paul Torrence, the father of the 
present Mayor of the city of Cincinnati, and that he 
built on Brush Creek, in Adams county, the pioneer 
furnace of Southern Ohio, and that Colonel Samuel 
Paul was born in 1760; his father, George Paul, moved 
on the farm in 1768, and died in 1778 ; and that Colonel 
James Paul died July 9th, 1841, aged eighty-one years* 
and that he was twenty-five years old at the time of 
Crawford's defeat, and was unmarried, are facts that 
might be thought of but little importance to some, but 
the future historian may regard them as facts of inesti- 
mable value. 



NARRATIVE 



Wonderful Escape, etc., 

OF COLONEL JAMES PAUL. 



My present intention in furnishing you for publica- 
tion this copy of the narrative of Colonel James Paul's 
almost miraculous escape from the Sandusky Indians 
at the time of Colonel Crawford's defeat, is two-fold — 
to give the public and the many friends of Colonel Paul 
a true statement of that hair-breath escape, and in the 
second place to correct an error into which some writers 
have fallen, as to the motive of Colonel Crawford and 
his noble band of volunteers in going to Upper San- 
dusky, which object was in reality to whip the 
Wyandottes and bands of hostile Indians, and to burn 
their town ; and not, as erroneously reported, to com- 
plete the slaughter of the remainder of the peaceable 
Christian Moravian Indians. 

In the spring of 1782 a scheme was formed and put 
on foot, the object of which was to check the Sandusky 
Indians, principally that of the Wyandotte tribe, which 



Wonderful Escape of 



tribe was at that time the most bold, daring, and 
ferocious of any of the other hostile tribes, whose dep- 
redations on the frontier settlers had grown hard to be 
borne. 

A further object of the scheme was the destruction 
of the Indian town at Upper Sandusky, and thus to 
check and put a stop, if possible, to the scalping, mur- 
dering, and plundering which was continually commit- 
ted by the hostile Indians on the defenseless settlers 
on the frontier of West Virginia and West Pennsyl- 
vania. 

It is not true that the object of Colonel Crawford 
and his volunteer companies was to go to Upper San- 
dusky and slaughter and kill off the balance or remain- 
der of the peaceable Moravian Indians, as stated by 
Weems and one other author, who have misstated the 
object of these brave, noble-hearted volunteers, who, 
under Colonel Crawford, risked their lives in an ene- 
my's country. Surely it could not be the object of 
these men to go so far into an enemy's country for the 
sole purpose of completing the slaughter of a few 
remaining Moravian Indians, while they could turn 
their hands against the Wyandotte tribe and their hostile 
allies, and thereby perform a better service and do a 
nobler action. I will here let Colonel James Paul give 
his narrative of his hair-breadth escape from the In- 
dians at the time of Crawford's defeat : 

In the month of January, 1826, I called upon Col- 
onel James Paul, and received a satisfactory statement 
of his narrow escape from the camp-ground of Upper 
Sandusky on his retreat homeward. In his report to 



Colonel James Paul. 



me of Crawford's Campaign he contradicted the state- 
ment of Weems, particularly in that that it was not 
the scheme, or any part of it, for Colonel Crawford and 
his volunteers to go out and kill off the few remaining 
Christian Moravian Indians. Colonel Paul further 
stated to me that Weems made another misstatement 
where, in speaking of Colonel Crawford's volunteers, 
he says they were all volunteers from the immediate 
neighborhood of Ohio, except one company from Ten 
Mile, in Washington county, Pennsylvania ; when the 
fact was, said Colonel Paul, they were all volunteers 
from Fayette county, Pennsylvania, from the east side 
of the Monongahela River, east of Brownsville, except 
one company from Ten Mile, in Washington county, 
Pennsylvania, and the command of the volunteers was 
given to Colonel Crawford, who marched the men from 
Benson, now Uniontown, on the 20th of May, 1782, 
on to Brownsville, then called Redstone Old Fort, 
where more volunteers joined us, and on the 22d of 
May we arrived at Cat Fish, now Washington, Penn- 
sylvania, where more volunteers, a company from Ten 
Mile, joined us. 

On the 24th we left Washington, Pennsylvania, and 
on the 25th arrived at the Ohio River, but did not cross 
until the 26th of May, 1782. Our volunteers then and 
there numbered four hundred and eighty-two men. 
We crossed the Ohio River at the old Indian Mingo 
town, and from there we took up over the hill and 
traveled on an old Indian trail near where the villages 
of Jefferson and Salem (now Anapolis) now stand, on 
the dividing ridge. We traveled on the ridge until 



8 Wonderful Escape of 



the Indian trail we traveled on intersected another trail 
leading out from the Ohio Paver opposite where Wells- 
burg now stands. The Indian trail led us on westward 
to the Moravian towns on the west side of the Mus- 
kingum river. The names of these Moravian towns in 
these days were Shonnenberg, Sharon, Goshen, and 
Naden Hutten. At all these Moravian towns silence 
and desolation reigned ; all was desolation, owing to 
the massacre of these peaceable Christian Indians by 
Colonel Williamson's desperate set of insubordinate, 
unpolished, half-civilized frontier settlers, in the month 
of March, 1782, previous to our design of marching 
out to destroy Wyandotte towns at Upper Sandusky. 

These men. after they had murdered all the Christian 
Moravian Indians, great and small, male and female, 
that they could lay their hands on (and it is said none 
escaped except an Indian boy ten or twelve years old, 
by creeping out through a window while those fiends 
were engaged in dispatching his relatives, and escaping 
to the Wyandotte tribe at Upper Sandusky, conveying 
the intelligence of the massacre to the hostile Indians), 
set fire to the corn-cribs and burnt them up, together 
with all their contents. For it was considered neces- 
sary that the corn should be 'burnt or destroyed to pre- 
vent its falling into the hands of the Wyandottes, or 
other hostile bands of marauding Indians. 

After the news of the massacre of these peaceable 
Christian Indians had spread abroad, it was strongly 
denounced by the public generally, as an uncalled for 
atrocity, and Colonel Williamson was severely censured 
for suffering such a heinous offense to be committed 



Colonel James Paul. 



before his eyes, and that too by men under his com- 
mand. It is true, these men were under the command 
of Colonel Williamson, but not under his control. 
They were a set of desperate, wicked, unprincipled 
men — frontier settlers ; such men as may always be 
found upon the outskirts of civilization — men that bore 
a deadly hatred to all Indians of every tribe, and would 
neither be advised nor controlled by their commander 
but took the work into their own hands, and as any 
insubordinate set of men would do under such circum- 
stances, regardless of consequences. 

These men afterward strove to make the public be- 
lieve, as a palliation of their wicked deed, that they 
had found clothing among these pet Indians that had 
been stripped off of their wives and daughters after they 
had been tomahawked and scalped by the Indians, and 
that the sight of these well-known articles of family 
clothing so exasperated and stirred up such a spirit of 
revenge in the bosoms of those men that Colonel Wil- 
liamson had no control over them ; they took the mat- 
ter into their own hands, and these facts concerning 
the want of subordination were reported by the men 
who were present but took no part in the murder, but 
exonerated Colonel Williamson from all blame. 

Our volunteers sauntered about the desolated Mora- 
vian town to see what they could see, and that was but 
little, except the extreme lonely aspect of the place, 
but in doing so one of the men picked up a good gar- 
den spade and concluded to carry it with him, saying 
it would be' of service to bake bread on. 

We left the Moravian towns on the 30th of May, 



io Wonderful Escape 6J 



and nothing worthy of note occurred until after we 
arrived on the Sandusky plains, which was on the 4th 
day of June, where we camped, and on the 5th of June 
the battle commenced, and was renewed on the 6th of 
June, 1782. 

On these two days the volunteers suffered very much 
from extreme heat and the want of water, but our 
company did not suffer for want of water as much as 
others, for your father, with two canteens, carried 
water to our company from where a large tree had 
fallen out of root, and the opening made by the roots 
filled with rain water, and from this reservoir he sup- 
plied our company at the risk of his life, as bullets 
from the Indian rifles were flying all around us, and 
sometimes wounding a comrade at the sapling or tree 
where he stood. 

Daniel Canon and two other men of our company, 
filled with curiosity and the novelty of the situation, 
climbed up into scrubby bushy-topped trees and shot 
and killed, or wounded, several Indians secreted among 
the long grass, for whenever an Indian raised his head 
a little to see if he could get a shot at one of our men, 
some one of these sharpshooters would pop away at 
him from his hiding place in the tree-top. 

Colonel Crawford and his men, after battling with 
the Indians for near two days, and gaining nothing, 
but losing a great many valuable lives, and fearing 
that if they occupied their ground until next day it 
might prove disastrous, as our ammunition and pro- 
visions were nearly exhausted. 

Seeing that delay would be dangerous if not disas- 



Colonel yames Paul. 



1 1 



trous, a retreat was therefore ordered to take place by six 
o'clock on the night of the 6th of June, to be conducted 
with as much secresy as possible, leaving all the fires 
burning so as to deceive the Indians, and in making pre- 
parations for the retreat, bread had to be baked, and for 
that purpose some of the men had made use of a spade 
picked up near the Moravian town on our way out. 
The spade, while hot, had been thrown to one side, and 
I happened to set my foot on it, and the bottom being 
out of my moccasin, my foot was burned severely be- 
fore I felt the pain. For a while the pain was very 
severe, but at length it became easy and I fell asleep ; 
but I suppose I could not have slept long, for the last, 
time I saw your father — till I saw him afterward at 
home with my mother and sisters — he came to me and 
gave me a shake, at the same time saying, " Jamy, 
Jamy, up, and let us be off; the men are all going." 
I sprang to my feet and stepped to the sapling where 
my horse was tied, but to my sad disappointment my 
horse had slipped his bridle. 

I groped about in the dark and discovered two other 
horses tied to the same sapling, and my horse standing 
at their tails. This revived my drooping spirits. On find- 
ing my horse standing quiet, I bridled him and mounted, 
and about the same time a number of other horses 
were mounted by their owners, and all put out from 
the camp ground together, amounting in all to nine in 
number, and we made as much haste to get away as 
we could, considering the darkness of the road, and no 
roads but open woods to ride through, and no one to 
guide us. At this time the main body of the volun- 



1 2 Wonderful Escape of 

teers, under Colonel Williamson, were retreating on 
what we considered not as nigh a course home, leaving 
us nine and man) 7 other stragglers behind to take care 
of themselves as best the) 7 could, and to steer their own 
course homeward, and, as it turned out afterward, but 
few of these stragglers ever got home. They were 
either shot down and scalped, or, if made prisoners, 
they were tortured in a cruel manner, and sometimes 
burned at the stake. Hence, men who knew the 
Indian custom of treating prisoners of war, would 
rather suffer themselves to be shot or die by the blow 
of a tomahawk, than to suffer more deaths than one by 
torture. This was my determination when I sprang off 
from my four remaining comrades and was chased by 
two Indians for life, as I will shortly relate. 

I and my eight comrades had not advanced far, per- 
haps not over a mile, on our retreat, until we all rode 
into a large deep swamp. In this dismal swamp we 
all got our horses deeply plunged into the mire, so 
much so that we were compelled to dismount and take 
to our feet, leaving our horses to be got out by the 
Indians the next day or perish in the mire. As soon 
as we dismounted from our horses in the swamp, we 
were obliged to make our way as best we could by 
stepping from one tussic or bunch of grass to another 
all the way across the swamp. We had one little 
fearful man with us, that ought to have stayed at home ; 
he was too short in the legs to step at all times so as 
to reach the next tussic — hence he would slip into the 
mire and slush up to his armpits, and in this situation 
he would work and toil to get out, but could not for a 



Colonel James Paul. 1 3 

while. He would then raise the hue and cry for help, 
and beg of us for God's sake not to leave him. His 
hallooing and bawling was so loud that I was afraid he 
would bring the Indiaus upon us ; but by some means 
he got out of the swamp, and soon overtook us, well 
plastered with mud up to his armpits. 

I made but a poor out at walking, owing to the bad 
burn on the sole of my foot, and the bottom being out 
of my moccasin. However, my spirit and anxiety to 
get home bore me up, and I walked on in much pain. 
We traveled all that night, and the next day till noon, 
without rest or food. After we had stopped to rest I 
took from my knapsack the piece of Indian blanket I 
had found on the camp ground the evening before, and 
tore off another strap and wrapped it round my foot 
over the burn, which, by this time became sore and 
much inflamed. But the piece of blanket proved of 
great service, for, as it would wear through on the sore, 
I would shift it round, and when one piece was worn 
out I would replace it with another, and in this manner 
preserved my foot, as much as possible, from injurv. 
At this place we concluded to take some refreshment, 
as we had eaten nothing since the evening before. 

The place where we stopped to dine was all over- 
grown with high weeds, which we broke down and 
spread a blanket on, then each man took from his little 
store of provisions a portion of his ash cake, baked on 
the camp ground the evening before, and laid it on the 
blanket, which served us instead of a table cloth. We 
commenced eating, and had ate but a short time, when 
the little fearful man, who had made such a noise in 



14 Wonderful Escape of 

the swamp the night before, would be up by turns 
looking for Indians. At length he squatted down 
quickly, and in a low tone bade us hide. " There is 
Indians coming," he said. On hearing this, each man 
took his course and hid. For my part. I took the 
direction toward the Indian trail, and concealed myself 
in a large bunch of alder bushes, -where I had a full 
view of the Indians as they passed. All at once the 
foremost one on the trail stopped short, and that 
brought all the Indians behind him to a halt. 

They were all mounted on Indian ponies, twenty- 
five in number, and it appeared as if the Indians had 
heard a rustling noise made by the men in their haste 
to hide, for as soon as the Indians brought their horses 
to a halt, they looked and gazed round about and ap- 
peared to be listening, fully intent upon catching any 
sound or noise that was made. But our men were all 
soon hidden among the high weeds, and a deathlike 
stillness followed. In a very short time, hearing no 
noise, the foremost Indian gave his horse two or three 
kicks on the side, and a whistle, and the rest following 
his example, moved off on a trot toward Sandusky, 
still keeping their order in Indian tile. From the place 
of my concealment I had a full view of the twenty-five 
Indians who had given us such a scare, and caused us 
to hide. I could, with my rifle, have brought down 
any one of them, but I durst not, knowing that it would 
have brought about my own destruction and that of 
my comrades, for every one of those Indians was armed 
with a rifle, and on their way to Upper Sandusky. I 
and my comrades were glad to be thus rid of their 
company. 



Colonel James Paul. 1 Vj 

As soon as those Indians had gone out of sight, I 
and my comrades returned to the spot where the 
blanket lay, and each man gathered up what belonged 
to him and stored it away for future use, not having 
any desire, at the time, to finish our dinner. The 
scare we had gotten from the presence of so many In- 
dians, had the effect to make us feel satisfied that we 
had had, for the present, dinner enough, and we all 
started off on our course home, but could not shake off 
the fear of meeting Indians. 

On the evening of the same day. being the 7th of 
June, 1782, while we were pursuing our way across a 
large space of open ground, we saw, at a considerable 
distance from us, running off to our right, a solitary' 
Indian, but at too great a distance to shoot him. From 
this single Indian we apprehended no danger, but we 
afterward paid dearly for our security, as you shall 
hear. I remember . that after my return home, on 
relating the circumstance of seeing this solitary Indian, 
it was suggested to me that we should have turned off 
at a right angle and steered northward for a few miles, 
and then have turned east again, and by that means 
evaded the Indians that might follow us. But my 
reply was, that men who were acquainted with the 
sagacity of the Indians know that it is hard to evade 
their pursuit. They track white men, and Indians 
too, on leaves, grass, or bare ground, and it is said 
they can distinguish between the white man's track 
and that of the Indian, when the white man could see 
no track at all. 

But for. the timebeing, we marched heedlessly on in 



1 6 Wonderful Escape of 

security, keeping on our course until dark. We then 
lay down to rest and slept soundly and securely, hav- 
ing had no sleep since the night of the 5th, and but 
little then. 

On the morning of the 8th of June we pushed on in 
high spirits, believing, as we thought, we were leaving 
the camp ground and the Indians' some miles behind. 

This day, June. 8th, 1782, about ten o'clock in the 
morning, we passed over a small hill and descended 
into a valley below, when we were fired upon by a 
party of Indians concealed in ambush on our right. I 
was walking so close to the man on my left that I 
could have laid my hand on his shoulder, he on the 
left, and I on the right, next to the Indians, and yet 
my comrade was shot dead the first fire. The ball 
must have passed very close to me, and I supposed the 
Indian aimed to kill both of us with the same shot. 
But he was taken and I was left. Four of our men 
out of the nine fell at the first fire, and four of the 
remaining five took shelter behind trees. 

The Indians, after their first fire, rose to their feet 
and called out in broken English to surrender, and not 
a man of them should be hurt. But I could place no 
confidence in an Indian, so I therefore broke and ran 
off at the top of my speed ; but after running about 
twenty rods, I thought of my comrades, and on look- 
ing round in that direction, beheld the remaining four 
men all dead. Two were struck down by the toma- 
hawk, and the two that still remained fought bravely 
until overpowered by superior numbers. The Indians 
had it in their power at one time to have shot me 



Colonel y antes Paul. 1 7 

before I had got out of gun-shot, and as I ran in a 
lame hobbling manner, they may have supposed that I 
could be easily taken a prisoner by running me down, 
and then have their sport burning me at the stake. 
But, thank God, in this they missed their aim. And 
just as I supposed their aim was to take me alive, so 
it turned out to be ; for just as soon as they had 
slaughtered my comrades, I saw two of perhaps their 
swiftest runners start after me at full speed. On see- 
ing this I mended my gait. I now saw and considered 
my life was at stake for the first time during this cam- 
paign, and this thought infused more life, vigor, and 
energy into my frame, and made me soon forget my 
burnt foot, and cause me to gain ground as I advanced 
from my pursuers. 

When they discovered I was gaining on them they 
shot at, but missed me. These shots only made me 
run the faster, hoping and expecting soon to be out of 
reach of bullets. It was not long after they fired at 
me until one of them turned back, and soon after the 
second and last one left the pursuit and turned back 
to his comrades, leaving the race all to myself, for 
which I was thankful, and soon slackened my speed, 
and continued to take it more moderate all my journey 
through, until I crossed the Ohio River and reached 
home. 

The evening of the 8th of June, 1782, a day I came 
near losing my life, and on which I lost by the Indian 
tomahawk and rifle, eight of my companions, as night 
began to close in, I thought it prudent to look out a 
place of concealment, not knowing but some of . the 
3 



1 8 Wonderful Escape of 



Indians might be on my track all day. At length I 
found an old hollow log with a large cavity, into which 
I crept feet foremost, taking my gun in with me. 
Here in this retreat I rested and slept soundly till 
morning. This ended my third night out since I left 
the battle ground. On the morning of the 9th of June 
I left my place of concealment, much refreshed by 
sleep and rest, both of which I much needed, and again 
took my course for home. But at first I could hardly 
walk a step, my foot being so sore and much swollen 
and inflamed, from the manner in which the Indians 
forced me to use it the day before. 

And now my provision was gone, and the only sus- 
tenance I had until I crossed the Ohio River was one 
young blackbird I had caught, and service berries at 
this time ripe and in many places plenty, on my way 
homeward. I now traveled at an easy rate, but my 
progress was much retarded owing to my lameness, 
and having to stop frequently to gather service berries 
for food; but I progressed slowly on, not forgetting to 
keep a sharp lookout for Indians, but saw no more of 
them till long after my return home. 

In pursuing my homeward course I suppose I passed 
near where Mount Vernon, Knox county, now stands, 
where I struck the waters of Owl Creek, and passed 
down the same until near its junction with the Mohi- 
gan Creek. 

High up on Owl Creek I struck an Indian trail, and 
soon discovered fresh signs of Indians having passed 
on toward Sandusky. This discovery caused me to 
alter my course, for I had no wish to keep the trail, 



Colonel James Paul. 1 9 

fearing; I should meet Indians. Striking off from the 
trail, I took the nighest route to Tuscarawas River. 

After I left the trail at what I considered a safe dis- 
tance, I sat down to rest, and not far off I saw a shelv- 
ing rock, with abundance of dry leaves under it, which 
I thought would be good place to rest for the night, 
but. was afraid it was too near the Indian trail, and 
I concluded to travel that night and the next day, 
that I might be as far out of reach of the Indians as 
possible. 

I rose to my feet and made the attempt to proceed 
on my way, but after I had walked a few steps I 
found that I could not travel now after dark, for my 
head became dizzy, and I reeled and staggered like a 
drunken man, and I found I could gain no headway, 
so I gave up traveling that night and made my way 
to the shelving rock. I was aware that my weakness 
arose from a want of nourishing food. After I came 
to the shelving rock, I was afraid to lay down without 
first stirring up the leaves with my ramrod to find out 
if snakes stayed among them, but hearing no noise 
except what I made, I tumbled in, and slept well till 
morning. 

From this place I steered direct for the Tuscarawas 
River, which, on my arrival, I found too deep to cross. 
I turned up the stream till I came to a ripple, where 
I stripped off all my clothes and tied them in a small 
bundle, which I held in my left hand on the top of my 
head, while I held my gun in my right hand above 
the water. I then wadecl across the river, the water 
in the deepest place being up to my neck. I soon 



20 JVonderful Escape of 

dressed and ascended the hill from the river. At the 
top of the hill I discovered an old Indian trading camp, 
where, scattered over the ground, lay a great many 
whisky kegs, and the staves of many more gone to 
pieces. How or whence so many kegs and a few old 
whisky barrels had come or had been collected, I could 
not conjecture, for I felt sure that the Indians had no 
means of conveying them to that place at that time. 
White men must have done it ; but it appeared evi- 
dent that the place had been used long since as a ren- 
dezvous for Indian drink and frolic. 

Here, on this old camp ground, among the kegs and 
staves, I concluded to stay all night, it being almost 
sundown. Finding the gnats and musquitoes were 
likely to be troublesome, I struck up a fire — the first I 
had enjoyed the benefit of since I left the camp-fires 
on the plains. The old dry staves served for fuel to 
keep the fire up. I ran some risks in kindling a fire 
on a high hill in the Indian country, and on the very 
ground where they had had many drunken frolics, but 
I risked it, and no Indian was attracted to the fire to 
harm me. 

This night among the kegs was my fifth night out 
from camp. Early the next morning (the 11th of 
June, 1782), after sleeping most of the night, I left 
the old drinking ground and steered for the Ohio 
River, and on the morning of the 12th of June I 
arrived at said river a short distance above the mouth 
of Wheeling Creek, not far above where the town of 
Wheeling now stands. 

Finding no chance of crossing at that place, I kept 



Colonel y antes Paul. 2 1 

up the river until I got a short distance above the 
mouth of Rush Run, opposite Pumphrey's bar and 
bottom. At this place I concluded to cross, and pro- 
ceeded to construct a raft by tying old rails together 
with bark peeled from white- walnut bushes. These 
rails had floated down from the upper country, and 
lodged against a large sugar-tree which had fallen from 
the bank into the river. After I had completed my 
raft I shoved it into the river, and having procured a 
piece of shivered rail for a paddle, I took my gun in 
my hand and crawled on my raft on my hands and 
knees. I then paddled over to the Virginia shore safe. 
I was never more thankful in my life, resting sure that' 
I was safe from the Indians. 

Seeing a number of horses feeding on Pumphrey's 
bottom, next the river, I was fully bent on riding one 
of them. I took from my raft some of the bark and 
formed a halter, and approached the horses and tried 
to catch three or four of them, but not one would let 
me lay my hand on it. At length I put the halter on 
a poor old raw-boned mare, and gun in hand, I mounted 
and took up the hill on a path that led me to an im- 
provement with a cabin-house, and here, for the first 
time since I left the Ohio River on my outward trip, I 
heard the chickens crowing, but there were no inhab- 
itants, and not even a dog to bark. But still keeping 
on the path, I passed several improvements, at each of 
which the fowls would crow, but still no dog to bark, 
nor a human being to be seen. 

At length the path led me to a fort in Virginia Short 
Creek, and at the fort I found the neighbors had col- 



2 2 IVonderful Escape, etc, 



lected for safety. Runners had been sent around to 
warn them that Colonel Crawford and his volunteers 
had been defeated, and it was expected that the Indians 
would be in, and would soon be at their old work of 
murdering, scalping, and plundering the defenseless 
inhabitants ; and here at this fort I found several of my 
comrades who had escaped from the battle ground at 
Sandusky Plains, and wandered in like myself, in 
safety, but had reached the fort before me. 

I stayed at the fort till the next day, and there I 
procured a horse that I rode on to near Washington, 
Pennsylvania, where I had relatives living, and with 
them I stayed two nights, and from these relatives I 
got a passage on horseback to my own home, where, 
for several days nothing but gloomy expectation had 
been indulged in by my mother and sisters — they not 
knowing but I was killed and scalped by the Indians. 
Your father had arrived four days before me, and could 
give no satisfactory account of me, as he had not seen 
me after he awoke me at the camp-fire at retreating 
time on the night of the 7th of June, and I did not 
arrive home till the 15th of June, 1782. 

And here ends the narrative of Colonel James Paul, 
whose narrative had never been penned down until I 
did it in the month of January, 1826. 



r* 




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WONDERFUL ESCAPE 

— OF — 

olonel James "aul 



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